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| 1840 |
David Dale Owen completed his geologic maps and report on the lead mines of Iowa, Wisconsin and Illinois. He had hired 139 assistants the year before; geologists, surveyors and mining engineers to help him with the project, the report of which was submitted to Congress in 1840. |
| 1841 |
J. D. Forbes built a primitive seismograph. |
| 1842 |
Sir William Logan, director of the Geological Survey of Canada, noted that the oil seepages on the hills at Gaspe, near the mouth of the St. Lawrenee River, were located on anticlines. In London, David Dale Owen published "The Geology of the Western States." This same year, the brothers, H. D. Rogers and W. B. Rogers, published "On the Physical Structure of the Appalachian Chain.“ |
| 1843 |
James Hall published a geologieal quarto on the western section of New York and established what came to be known as the New York System. This was the year that Van Wrede suggested that local variations in the earth's magnetic field might be used as a means of locating rnagnetic ore deposits. |
| 1844 |
Robert Beart of Godmanchester, England was granted a patent for a rotary drilling machine using a rotating tool, hollow drilling rods, and circulating fluid to remove cuttings. |
| 1845 |
Robert Mallet (1810-1881) was born in Dublin and educated in Dublin, receiving the degree of Bachelor of Arts from Trinity College at the age of twenty. The next year he was taken into his father's construction and engineering firm as a partner and for the next fifteen years he busied himself with expanding the operations of the firm and in solving intricate engineering problems. At the age of thirty-five Mallet was reading about earthquakes in Lyell’s "Principles of Geology," when he came across a diagram which his engineering training told him was a physical impossibility. His interest aroused, Mallet turned to the work of John Michell on earthquakes which he found more to his liking.
Thus started the pioneer work on artificial earthquakes and the most important contribution to seismology of the nineteenth century. The experimental work of Mallet took place in the year 1845. In 1846, he read a paper before the Irish Royal Academy „On the Dynamies of Earthquakes." In his experiments of 1845 and later years, Robert Mallet used the following techniques. He buried a charge of gunpowder, which when detonated, gave off acoustic waves which were pieked up at varied distances on a seismoscope. The seismoscope consisted of a bowl of mercury from the surface of which was reflected a spot of light. A powerful telescope fitted with cross-hairs was trained on the spot of light on the mercury bowl. When the surface of the mercury was agitated the image disappeared. Consequently, the arrival of the wave was signified to the observer by the appearance of surface ripples which destroyed the image. The chronograph was started electrically by the firing of the gunpowder. As soon as the wave appeared at the seismoscope, the observer stopped the chronograph. The time of transit of the acoustic wave was thus established, which when combined with the accurately determined distance between shot point and scope, gave the velocity. Mallet did record different velocities for different geologic materials. The low sensitivity of his seismoscope prevented him from recording true velocities. |
| 1846 |
Alfred Nobel, a Swedish engineer, demonstrated at Helenborg, that nitroglycerine, invented the year before by Italian chemist, Ascanio Sobrero, at the University of Turin, was 13 times as powerful as gunpowder. |
| 1847 |
The American Association for the Advancement of Science was founded in Philadelphia. |
| 1848 |
Baron Roland Eotvos was born in Budapest on July 27th. |
| 1851 |
Ebenezer Emmons became state geologist for North Carolina. |
| 1853 |
The state of Missouri started its Geological Survey with George C. Swallow in charge. |
| 1854 |
Peter Lesley completed his study of a coal district for the Pennsylvania Railroad. His maps were contoured, the first use of this all-important graphical tool. In this same year, Benjamin Silliman, Jr. succeeded his father in the chair of Chemistry at Yale. Young Silliman's enthusiasm about the possibilities of drilling a weIl to oil production at Titusville, Pennsylvania, helped to make possible the success of the Drake weli. In 1864, Silliman put forth a glowing report on the possibilities of petroleum in southern California. This report was the cause of some rather costly oil speculation on the West Coast, where much was attempted but little oil production was found. |
| 1855 |
Adam Sedgwick published "A Synopsis of the Classification of the British Palaeozoic Rocks." In 1855, earth science was further enriched by the introduction of two independent theories of isostacy, one by George Bedell Airy and the other by John Henry Pratt. This same year, Ebenezer Ennnons published his "American Geology.“ |
| 1857 |
Henry D. Rogers became Regius Professor of Natural History at the University of Glasgow. |
| 1859 |
Charles Robert Darwin published "The Origin of Species." No other single volume had ever had so much influence on scientific thought. Darwin had studied geology under Adam Sedgwick while Darwin was in residence at Christ's College at Cambridge University. |
| 1859 |
Completion of the first commercial oil weIl, drilled specifically for petroleum, on Oil Creek, near Titusville, in Crawford County, Pennsylvania. |
| 1860 |
Henry D. Rogers stated before the Philosophical Society of Glasgow, Scotland, that the newly discovered oilfields of Pennsylvania were located on anticlines. |
| 1861 |
Thomas Sperry Hunt made the first widely disseminated pronouncement of the anticlinal theory of oil accumulation in „Notes on the History of Petroleum or Rock Oil." Originally the article had appeared in the July issue of the "Canadian Naturalist" but was later reprinted in the 1861 annual report of the Smithsonian Institute and also in the Chemical News, printed in London. |
| 1862 |
James D. Dana wro te his "Manual of Geology.“ |
| 1863 |
Sir William Logan published "The Geology of Canada“ in which he enunciated advocacy of the anticlinal theory. |
| 1864 |
The Kansas Geological Survey was brought into being. |
| 1866 |
John S. Newberry commenced his tenure of twenty six years at Columbia University's School of Mines. Reginald Aubrey Fessenden was born on October 6th at East Bolton, Quebec. |
| 1870 |
Thalen and Tiberg constructed the first magnetometer, a dip needle combined with a compass. |
| 1871 |
The American Institute of Mining Engineers was founded. |
| 1876 |
General H. L. Abbot took advantage of the explosion of 50,000 pounds of dynamite at Hallets Point in New York on September 24, 1876, to measure the velocity of transmission of seismic waves. He set up several Mallet-type seismoscopes in different azimuths and at distances varying from five to twelve miles from the explosion. Abbot increased the power of the viewing telescope and obtained substantially higher velocities than Mallet. General Abbot was with the Corps of Engineers of the United States Army. |
| 1876 |
Charles Robert Darwin published in one volume his two geological treatises, "Volcanic Islands“ and "South America.“ |
| 1878 |
William Peter Haseman was born near Linton, Indiana on May 4th. |
| 1879 |
Thalen published "On the Examination of Iron Ore Deposits by Magnetic Measurements.“ |
| 1880 |
Ludger Mintrop was born at Essen-Werden, Germany on July 18th. |
| 1884 |
Edward Orton, State Geologist of Ohio, pronounced that oil accumulation in Ohio was related to broad anticlines. |
| 1885 |
Milne and Gray first used a falling weight (thumper) to generate seismic waves in Japan. They recorded by mechanical seismographs on moving smoked glass plates. They recorded simultaneously with two seismographs in line, the first profiling. Milne and Gray also recorded the vertical and horizontal components of the seismic waves. The falling weight was abandoned in favor of explosive charges in order to increase the sensitivity. The effects of irregular terrain were studied. John Milne's report with the title "Seismic Experiments" listed a total of seventeen explosions. In this same year of 1885, Wallace Everette Pratt was born on March 15th near Phillipsburg, Kansas. |
| 1886 |
Everette Lee De Golyel' was born on October 9th near Greensburg, Kansas. |
| 1887 |
Von Sterneck developed a half-second portable pendulum suitable for relative gravity measurements. |
| 1888 |
Baron Roland von Eotvos, Professor of Experimental Physics at the University of Budapest, demonstrated how the Coulomb torsion balance could be used for more extensive studies of gravity variation. Dr. A. Schmidt of Stuttgart published "Wave Propagation and Earthquakes." He discussed the construction of travel time curves and pointed out that wave velocity would increase with depth. |
| 1889 |
F. A. Fouque and Michel Levy made some careful measurements of velocities in mines. Their photographically recording seismoscope had considerably higher sensitivity than anything previously used. Their velocity determinations checked in a general way the higher values obtained by General H. L. Abbot. In 1889, Beno Gutenberg was born at Darmstadt, Germany; the date was June 4th. |
| 1890 |
Baron von Eotvos completed his first torsion balance, a modification of the Coulomb balance. Sidney Powers was born at Troy, New York on September 10th. |
| 1891 |
Baron von Eotvos was inaugurated as President of the University of Sciences at Budapest. |
| 1892 |
Thomas Chrowder Chamberlin resigned as President of the University of Wisconsin to accept a position as the head of the Geology Department for the newly opened University of Chicago. Dr. Chamberlin wished to abandon administrative duties and return to research. |
| 1893 |
The severe earthquake of November 17th in Persia resulted in a death toll of an estimated 12,000 inhabitants. |
| 1894 |
Baron von Eotvos, was appointed Minister of Religion and Education for Hungary. Arville Irving Levorsen was born at Fergus Falls, Minnesota on July 5th. |
| 1895 |
Professor C. V. Boys made his preparations to repeat the Calendish experiment with the John MicheIl torsion balance but employing his newly invented fibers for the suspension of the torsion rod. Professor Boys determined the specific gravity of the earth to be 5.527; which ls generally considered to be the best value so far established. |
| 1896 |
Baron von Eotvos invented the magnetic torsion balance, the forerunner of core orientatien; and he published „Investigations Concerning Gravitation and Earth Magnetism.“ |
| 1897 |
Professor Otto Hecker used artificial earthquakes to make velocity measurernents. He placed nine horizontal seismographs in line, seventy meters apart. |
| 1898 |
Rollin D. Salisbury became Dean of the Ogden Schoel of Science at the University of Chicago. |
| 1899 |
C. G. Knott presented his paper concerned with the propagation of seismic, waves and their refraction and reflection at elastic discontinuities. The Union Oil Company of California hired young Stanford University graduate William W. Orcutt, trained in civil engineering and geology. |
| 1900 |
William W. Orcutt organized the first petroleum geology department in the western states. |
| 1901 |
Roland von Eotvos made the first exhaustive field survey by the torsion balance on the ice of Lake Balaton in Hungary. Helmert gave a paper on gravity variation with latitude. |
| 1902 |
Roland von Eotvos introduced the double-beam torsion balance which is essentially the instrument of today. He used this torsion balance to indicate the subsurface extension of the Jura Mountains in France. |
| 1903 |
Frank HilI first used cement in an oil weIl to shut off water at Lompoc, California. |
| 1904 |
In October of 1904, the Higgins Oil and Fuel Company struck natural gas at what was to be called the Humble Oilfield, the cornerstone of the Humble Oil and Refining Compauy. |
| 1905 |
Lovic Pierce Garrett and Robert Welch jointly conceived the idea of using seismic waves in prospecting for salt domes in the Texas Gulf Coast. |
| 1906 |
The San Franciseo Earthquake and Fire occurred on April 18th and 19th. First edition of Chamberlin and Salisbury "General Treatise on Geology" was printed. |
| 1907 |
Emil Wiechert and K. Zoeppritz published "Uber Erdbebenwellen," a monumental work on the theory of wave transmission through the Earth. E. T. Dumble, Chief Geologist for the Southern Pacific Railroad, and President of the Kern Trading and Oil Company, hired five Stanford University graduates in geology and set them up as "resident geologists" to collect and report surface and subsurface information for their respective assigned areas. |
| 1908 |
In May of this year, Professor Otto Hecker demonstrated the correctness of the principle that the weight of an eastward mowing body is less, the weight of a westward, moving body is more, than the weight of a body at rest on the earth's surface. Norman Snively became the first geologist to be hired by the Standard Oil Company of California as a geologist. Eric A. Starke had been handling some phases of geology for the company as early as 1890 but his title was Chief Chemist.In 1907-1908, W. R. Hamilton organized a Geological Department for the Associated Oil Company, employing Roy M. Ferguson, R. P. McLaughlin, Robert Moran, W. L. Walker and Billy Williams. |
| 1909 |
A. Mohorovicie presented his theories about the discontinuity between the earth's crust and the earth's mantle, designated in time to come as „Moho.“ |
| 1910 |
Emil Wiechert published a paper in which he described procedure in refraction profiling which subsequently became commercial practice. Wiechert's pupil, Ludger Mintrop, conceived the idea that the seismograph might have commercial usefulness. |
| 1911 |
Ludger Mintrop published the results of his experiments on generating artificial earthquakes by the use of a falling weight. |
| 1912 |
Eric A. Starke assumed the title of Chief Geologist and also became the first Director of Exploration for the Standard Company of California. J. F. Hayford and William Bowie presented a study of the effect of topography and isostatic compensation on the intensity of gravity. The General Petroleum Company began the use of resident geologists in their California oilfields. |
| 1913 |
J. E. Elliott became Chief Geologist for the Shell Oil Company of California, the first Ameriean honored with such a position. |
| 1914 |
Alexander Deussen became the first geologist to recognize the existenee of the important Mexia fault in East Texas, when he presented a USGS bulletin on Water Supply. Van der Gracht employed the diamond core drill in Romania. On April 2nd, Reginald Fessenden filed the original Sonie Sounder applieation for determining ocean depths, the first use of the reflection methode. In this year micropalentology was introduced as an aid in the search for petroleum. In 1914 G. Bergstrom found ore deposits in Sweden by the use of alternating current equipotential mapping. In 1914, Everette De Golyer made an unsuccessful attempt to procure an Eotvos torsion balance from Budapest. William Bowie published "Investigations of Gravity and Isotaey.“ |
| 1915 |
Early in 1915, Everette De Golyer proposed the organization of a geologieal society as a University of Oklahoma extension project to Professor Charles Henry Taylor, head of the Department of Geology. Professor Taylor assumed the initiative of interesting other geologists. J. EImer Thomas, also bent on organizing the geologists of the southwest, invited some thirty friends who were geologists to have dinner with him in Tulsa in October, to diseuss the matter. The French Army introduced Sound Ranging to locate German artillery. |
| 1916 |
The British Army perfected its own sound ranging instruments and technique, which proved superior to that employed by the French. The Germans experimented with Sound Ranging late in the year. The year before Captain Lawrence Bragg had been put in charge of British Sound Ranging and after experimenting with French systems had decided on the use of equipment devised by Lucien Bull, a British physicist. Before the end of 1915, Captain Bragg was notified that he had been awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics for a paper published jointly with his father. The forerunner for the American Association of Petroleum Geologists was formed at Norman, Oklahoma. The initial meeting was held on January 7th and 8th, presided over by Professor Charles H. Taylor. Professor Taylor had mailed invitations to this meeting on October 25, 1915. Some 60 geologists were in attendance. In 1916, D. Pekar and E. Fekette successfully surveyed the Egbell oilfield near Gbely, Czechoslovakia with the Eotvos torsion balance on behalf of the D' Arcy Exploration Company. |
| 1917 |
On January 15th, Reginald Fessenden filed his patent application on "Methods and Apparatus for Locating Ore Bodies," the first patent to suggest the seisrnic method to explore for mineral wealth. Eugene Wesley Shaw published "Possibility of Using Gravity Anomalies in the Search for Salt Dome Oil and Gas Pools." In this year, Hugo V. Boeckh, Director of the Geological Survey for Hungary, first called attention to the fact that anticlines and domes with light or heavy cores, could be located by means of the Eotvos torsion balance. In 1916-1917, Everett Carpenter, Chief Geologist of the Empire Gas and Fuel Company, had assembled a staff of over 200 geologists. His recruiting drive had taken him to the campuses of most of the major western universities. Teams of surface geologists were employed in extensive operations in Oklahoma and Kansas. |
| 1918 |
The Ising Gravity Meter was successfully employed to locate ore bodies in the Scandinavian countries. Like later gravity meters, the gravitational pull of a heavy mass was balanced against a form of elastic force in the Ising instrument. Dr. Charles Blizard Bazzoni, a llarrison Research Fellow at the Uni ve'rsity of London frqm the University of Pennsylvania, joined. the war effort when the Uni ted States entered World War One and as a Lieutenant in the Engineers Corps, took charge of American Sound Ranging efforts, making use of the Lucien Bull equipment developed by the British. American sound ranging units began operations in 1918. lvilhelm Schweydar and Hugo V. Boeckh made the first t orsion balance survey of a 0.3.1 t dome, the Hanigsen dome near Hannover. Core drilling was introauced into Oklahoma by the Marland Company and also by the Shell Company. On March 1, 1918, ~"allace Pratt j oined the Humble Oil and Refining Company as Chief Geologist. |
| 1919 |
Robert Brooks Whitehead joined the Atlantic Refining Company as Chief Geologist. Baron Roland von Eotvos died in Budapest on April 8th. Dr. J. Th. Erb, in charge of exploration worldwide for the Dutch Shell group, discussed the advisability of using torsion balance and the advisability of using the seismograph, as exploration tools, with Everette De Golyer. Ludger Mintrop made his first application for a German patent for the use of the refraction seismograph. J. C. Karcher began an extensive correspondence with Dr. J. A. Udden, geologist for the University of Texas, relative to the feasibility of seismic prospecting for petroleum. |
